Archive for February 2008

This exhibition brings together contemporary artists whose work examines the politics, events, and consequences surrounding war. For the current Iraq war, perhaps more than any prior American war, truth and interpretation of facts lie at the center of the conflict. War Stories features photographs by Nina Berman, paintings by Jenny Holzer, and the American premiere of a 10 channel video installation entitled 9 Scripts from a Nation at War by a collective of artists.

War Stories is curated by Lisa Tung, Director of Curatorial Programs and Professional Galleries at MassArt.

Alixandra Fazzina has been following since 2007 the story of the African refugees, mainly Ethiopian, who will risk everything to cross the Gulf of Aden to Yemen and a new life. Fazzina is one of the few photographers to have documented the refugees, the camps in Bossaso, the smugglers and the embarcation onto the boats for their perilous crossing. The dangers stacked against them, from the elements, the authorities, to the smugglers themselves. This story by Alixandra Fazzina was recently featured in The Sunday Times Magazine.

This is the third exhibition about MAGNUM to be held at the Stedelijk. The first, in 1964, stressed the post-war humanist ethics propagated by the founder members and was based on the collection of photographs acquired by the museum since 1958. The second, in 1990, emphasised the vision of the individual photographers. This reflected the growing interest in auteurship at a time when the print media were increasingly losing ground to television. The present exhibition presents these individual views and relates them to current thinking about the visual presentation of history.

Above: Philip Jones Griffiths, Near the old American base south of Quang Tri, a young girl stands guard over her patch of saplings marked off by rows of old artillery shells. She is responsible for their safety, warding off birds and rats. From the bookAgent Orange – Collateral Damage in Viet Nam (Trolley, 2003)